PMCI - May 2021

PMCI
BOOK REVIEW
I'd like to take the time to introduce
you to our model featured left, a
friend of mine named Travis Partyka,
affectionally known as 'Big Red',
being 6'4" and 240lbs. He was the
real deal, 2-14INF 10th MTN DIV
Sniper, contractor and my friend.
Well remembered and sorely missed
27/6/84 - 24/01/21 RIP TP.
Baz, PMCI Team.
COUNTERINSURGENCY:
THEORY AND REALITY
In today’s world I think it’s important that we understand certain
things better than we have in the past, and as we live in societies
that are seeing discord from the populace as never before in
recent years, one of the topics I wish to understand more is that
of counter-insurgency, and as a wider topic the insurgencies that
have come together to create what we now refer to a “COIN”,
and I’ve been lucky enough to have a copy of Counterinsurgency:
Theory and Reality to check out.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines counterinsurgency as any
“military or political action taken against the activities of guerrillas
or revolutionaries” and can be considered “war” by a state
against a non-state adversary. Counterinsurgency can be further
defined as the efforts to defeat and confine a rebellion against a
constituted authority. While it has become a buzz-word in the last
twenty years, it is as old as society itself, and in military sciences,
counterinsurgency is one of the main operational approaches of
irregular warfare..
The concise history offered in Counterinsurgency: Theory and
Reality discusses the development of modern counterinsurgency
over the last two hundred years, beginning with the origins of
modern insurgency from the concept of ‘small wars’ and colonial
warfare, through the ideas of early insurgents including Clausewitz
and the theories of Lawrence of Arabia, to the methods of 20thcentury
insurgents, including Mao and Che Guevara.
It then examines a number of post-1945 insurgencies and how
western armies have tried to counter them, in particular how the
French tried to counter insurgencies in Indochina and Algeria,
and then the US in Vietnam, and the reaction to the American
experience there. This is compared with the British approach in
the years after World War II, particularly in Malaya, but also in
Kenya and Northern Ireland.
Against this backdrop the book offers an examination of
counterinsurgency in Afghanistan and Iraq, the rise of COIN
literature, and the subsequent backlash against that literature,
concluding with a discussion on the future of COIN.
Counterinsurgency: Theory and Reality is available currently
on pre-order, releasing on June 30, 2021.
Daniel Whittingham is Lecturer in the History of Warfare and
Conflict at the Department of History, University of Birmingham.
He is interested in all aspects of the conduct of war, but with a
particular focus on British military history, military thought and
strategy. His main research interests are British colonial warfare
in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, counterinsurgency,
the First World War and the Second World War. Stuart Mitchell is
Senior Lecturer at the Department of War Studies, Royal Military
Academy Sandhurst. He has taught counterinsurgency to the
British Army for several years as well as to overseas personnel
on diplomatic visits.
Publisher : Casemate (June 30, 2021)
Language : English
Hardcover : 192 pages
ISBN-10 : 1612009484
ISBN-13 : 978-1612009483
BOOK REVIEW
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